Airport bags 3rd slot on growth rate route

PUNE: The Lohegaon airport has bagged the third slot among 10 facilities in the over 5 million passenger capacity category in terms of the annual growth rate in 2017-18, senior Airports Authority of India (AAI) officials said here on Sunday.
The airport’s growth rate (20.6%) was third after the facilities in Kolkata and Ahmedabad. “Among the 10 airports, Pune is at the 9th place with 8.16 million passengers in 2017-18,” , Pune airport director Ajay Kumar said.

The 10 airports in the category are the ones in Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Cochin, Goa, Ahmedabad, Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai and Pune.

When it comes to domestic passengers, the airport recorded a total of 7.89 million passengers in 2017-18 — a growth rate of 21.2%. “Among all the airports, Pune is the only one operating with the ‘Code C’ aircraft. All other facilities are capable of handling bigger aircraft,” Kumar added.

‘Code C’ aircraft have a wingspan of more than 24m but less than 36m. The outer main gear wheel span of such aircraft is more than 6m and less than 9m. Aircraft such as Boeing 737-700, Airbus A-320 and Embraer ERJ 190-100 fall in the ‘Code C’ category. These aircraft cannot carry more than 200 flyers.

In March, the airport authorities had announced that its passenger traffic for 2017-18 had crossed the 8 million-mark. Besides, the Airports Council International (ACI) had in March released its final report of the last financial year for the airport service quality (ASQ). In the report, the Pune airport had bagged the third position in the category of best airport by size and sub-category of 5-15 million passengers per year.

Aviation experts are, however, not convinced by the numbers. “The figures are much below than the city’s potential. Pune’s demand is pushing the air traffic growth. The demand created by the industry, trade and commerce, education, IT, tourism and agriculture sectors Pune and western Maharashtra has has made Pune an internationally-sought-after business destination,” aviation expert and analyst Dhairyashil Vandekar said.

“In 2016-17, Pune was the tenth busiest airport in the country. Over the past years, it has consistently recorded a year-on-year passenger growth of 25%, and above. Currently, the average footfall per day at the airport is around 22,000 The Airports Authority of India under the civil aviation ministry is responsible for creating, upgrading, maintaining and managing (civil aviation) infrastructure in India,” he said.

“If the AAI had envisioned the air traffic growth at Pune and taken futuristic steps for expanding the civil terminal and support infrastructure, the airport here would have crossed the 100 flights per day and 1 crore annual passenger-mark long ago . Unfortunately, this did not happen. Clearances were given to new flights to meet the demand, without increasing infrastructure such as terminal size, parking bays and other essential amenities,” Vandekar added.